Keep Me Closest

The nib danced nimbly across the crisp paper, leaving behind a royal blue trail of ink as it formed unfeeling letters and words. Lists of various battle strategies. Outcomes of forgotten wars. Dates of glorious victories. Each one was written flawlessly in Aaron’s neat penmanship as he gazed with foggy eyes out of the tall study window.

For a morning lesson, Wartime Studies was one of the worst. It was more detestable than Brussels sprouts, more sleep inducing than council meetings, and worse than having to clean out the horse stables. All because of the simple fact that it was completely and utterly pointless.

Aaron was the youngest son of four children. Marcus, the oldest, was 27, unmarried, and first in line for the throne. Harriet was 26, a beautiful enceinte woman betrothed to a fine, wealthy businessman from the city. And Aaron?

Well, he was 19, pessimistic, lonely and feeling completely unnecessary.

He let out a tiny sigh, resting his chin lightly on the palm of his hand. He stopped writing altogether, tuning out of his teacher’s lecture as his eyes wandered the path of a travelling house fly. It buzzed past his face and flew in circles, freely roaming the air until it landed tidily on the desk cluttered with papers.

Almost immediately, a sharp tap shocked Aaron into reality, and the fly was no more resting on the desktop.

“Prince Aaron,” the bearded middle-aged man began, his ruler firm in his grasp, “I trust you are listening well? Your father would yet again be displeased with you if you did not work in lessons.”

“Yes sir,” he answered robotically. His quill rolled between his soft fingertips, under the watchful gaze of the Battle Professor.

His expression wavered as he looked down at the uninterested teen, but it was soon as stoic as it had been before. “Recently your concentration has been slipping considerably. These lessons are important for your future! What if something happened to Marcus? Then you would be King. But you wouldn’t have a clue what to do when it came to war! Thankfully Marcus was very bright when it came to my class, so unfortunately you’ll find it harder to get in my good books, but that should push you to achieve. We only want what’s best for you.”

Aaron chewed his lip awkwardly, looking away from the window. The teacher walked to the front of the room again with a disappointed sigh, shuffling papers around on his desk.

“Well, lesson is over. You are dismissed, Your Majesty.”

Aaron rolled his eyes unnoticeably as he pushed his chair under the desk and left the room. This part of the castle was quietly empty, no maids or butlers flitting about between rooms or kitchens. It was a section solely dedicated to teaching, with various classrooms filled with materials appropriate for that certain subject. His boots clacked against the polished wooden floor as he strolled aimlessly around, his hands deep in the pockets of his trousers.

Before he knew it, he was standing outside the door to his room. The floor surrounding the door was carpeted in vibrant red with golden trim, and the door itself was finely polished, the brass handle glinting in the dim light. He pushed it open, closing it behind him as he made his way towards the bed. He fell against the plump cushions with a tired groan, and proceeded to glare dramatically at the ceiling.

The first and foremost problem here was that he found his life incredibly boring. He had sneaked into the village before, he had seen the fun and excitement that the townspeople had despite their lack of wealth and sometimes even homes. He had been taught that, for many, poverty ruled over how they lived and ruined their happiness, and yes he could understand that to some people it did, but… he couldn’t understand how so many could smile through their problems. It made him feel a tad guilty to be a prince; the only thing he had to worry about was whether it would be roast duck or leg of lamb served at dinner that night.

The second, lesser problem had gradually made itself known over the course of his adolescence, when he began his training for potential kinghood. It became more and more obvious as years passed that he was hopeless at certain skills the job required (such as actually turning up to meetings), never mind his distinct droop in motivation simply because he knew he would never rule. He had gotten himself disastrously stuck in the mindset that he was not good for anything at all, and that Marcus would always be the favourite son.

He let out a built up sigh, blowing air over his top lip.

“Aaron? Are you in there?”

Before he could even begin to fathom an answer, the door opened and a small brunette slipped through the door, a light-hearted smirk on her pretty face and one hand cradling the large bump on her stomach.

“Harriet.”

His older sister Harriet smiled at her baby brother relaxing like a child on his now messy bed. It was at times like this she wished he was in no way related to the royal family. Although Az, as she affectionately called him, never showed it, she knew that he longed to be a normal kid, with normal friends and normal education, living a normal lifestyle with perhaps a good paying job. And a pretty wife.

Her pregnancy really brought out her maternal instincts. Sometimes she didn’t even know where it came from.

“I just came to see how you were – Kennedy and I are only here for a visit, before we go home… he wants me to stay put, being with a child at the moment, but I just can’t seem to keep still!” She chuckled and sat down beside him, lying back against the headboard as she stroked his mop of blonde hair.

“Kennedy’s with father, isn’t he,” Aaron sighed, reaching up to put his hands behind his head.

“Trying to get on his good side? Yes, yes he is,” Harriet said, giggling. She grinned as he smiled at the ceiling, his eyes unfocused.

As she looked around the bedroom, she could see snatches of the person Aaron wanted to be. The bed itself was a normal double bed, no luxurious satin covers or expensive swans feather pillows. His father of course had objections – ‘he is a prince, it is essential he has the best of everything!’ – but Aaron had personally made sure none of the maids swapped anything when cleaning it. It was plain, but comfortable. The rest of the room was void of extravagant decoration, very unlike the rest of the rooms in the castle, and only the vast wardrobe covering the far wall gave any sign of the owner being extremely wealthy.

“I understand how you feel, Az,” she began, pausing as she felt him tense underneath her. “No, really. I do. You were only about 6 years old at the time, but when I was 13 I ran away from home because I couldn’t take being me. I hated how Father controlled every aspect of my life. I felt… claustrophobic, in a way.”

Aaron looked up under his now messy hair at his older sister, who was staring dreamily at the other end of the room.

“But you can’t let him bring you down. It’s your life, after all – find your own way. I’ve found mine.”

He didn’t respond. He had already told himself that sentence a million times over, but still he couldn’t find the courage to actually break away from his roots. What he knew was safe, and despite having seen the village below the castle for himself, the world beyond that was something better left unexplored. He was scared of the change. He was scared of being by himself.

But he still wanted to be free.

Harriet pressed her lips gently to his forehead and stood up slowly, both her hands placed on the bottom of her back. “Oh goodness, if I don’t collapse before I have this baby, I shall die of exhaustion. Not long now before the birth!”

Aaron smiled warily at her, the emotion not quite reaching his eyes. Harriet glanced at him with a light-hearted sigh.

“I shall see you sometime soon. Goodbye, Aaron. Be happy for me.”

“Bye.”

As the door closed quietly, Aaron sat up on his bed and rubbed his eyes tiredly. He swung his legs over the side and stood up, stretching until his back popped, before checking his hair in the mirror. Harriet had managed to make it stick up this way and that, like almost every time she played with his blonde locks. Shaking his head fondly, he tried his best to flatten it a little, before following his sister’s footsteps out of the bedroom door.

“Harriet!”

She wasn’t too far down the hall, and Aaron could see the huge smile stretched out across her face as she saw him.

“Say hello to Kennedy for me, and tell him he should be catering to your every whim!”

She laughed properly this time, the sound ringing through the echoing halls. “I will! Goodbye!”

He waved after her as she turned the corner, disappearing from sight. With one last stretch, he turned around quickly and began strolling in the opposite direction. He skipped down the stairs and slipped unnoticed into the servant’s corridors, through the many twists and turns around stone corridors and under firm archways. This part of the castle was noticeably colder than the rest, and although King Peter liked to take care of his staff like friends, Aaron had to admit the wing they used was not as nice as the rest of the house. In parts it was almost barren.

Eventually, he came across the second kitchen. It wasn’t as big as the first kitchen, and was mostly used to supply food to all staff and often Aaron too, when his father was too busy to awkwardly dine with him. The blonde preferred sitting among his staff, finding they provided much more interesting conversation. Hearing his stomach grumble at the delicious yet simple smells from inside, he slowly edged open the kitchen door, crouching down to avoid being seen. He carefully and silently crawled into the room, sneaking over to the large wooden table in the center as the cooks and kitchen staff conversed loudly above the general noise of the appliances. He stood cautiously, leaned over, grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl standing amongst the clutter, then vanished back through the door and out into the garden. Like a professional.

The garden outside the kitchen was as vivacious as plants could be; brightly coloured flowers were planted around large rose bushes and apple trees, coordinated and controlled into a maze of intense confusion. Flattened stones had been hammered into the ground to create a haywire path through the foliage, winding around clusters of orchids and hybrid tea roses. There were no food plants in this area except for the apple trees – the tomato garden and vegetable patch were located further along where the first kitchen was.

He smirked to himself as he bit into the slightly bitter fruit, and started walking casually through the garden. As he walked past the apple trees, he made a note to himself to tell the gardener the fruit was ripe for picking, and that he wanted the best Soleil d’Or freshly cut, wrapped, and sent to Harriet’s home in the outskirts of the city.

And then, something rustled in the bushes behind him.

He span around at his waist, his eyes carefully scrutinising every leaf, every flower, every fruit. He turned around fully, stepping tentatively back along the trail with increasing nerves.

“Hello?”

There was, of course, no answer. After all, if someone was trying to spy on him, why would they answer? It was a stupid question to ask into the silence, but it was one Aaron asked instinctively.

He closed his eyes and shook his head, taking another bite out of his apple, before turning around.

And staring into the startled jade eyes of a young red haired woman.